As the European Union moves towards reducing the amount of emissions, larger companies must also change their behavior. Among other things, it is important to make it clear to employees how to operate more environmentally friendly. In order to help organizations, the Erasmus project brings together IT specialists, lawyers and employees in the field of education. 

How to convince employees to drive less, to meet online instead of flying to another country, or to help them understand that digital waste also pollutes the environment? This is what the two-year Erasmus+ project NWOW4NETZERO is currently dealing with, to which TalTech has also extended a helping hand.

TalTech law professor Maria Claudia Solarte-Vasquez, Andrijana Bogdanovska, head of the project coordinating center, and Mélissa Levaillant, from the French research center Conseil & Reserche, will talk about the project in more detail.

As the European Union moves towards reducing the amount of emissions, larger companies must also change their behavior. Among other things, it is important to make it clear to employees how to operate more environmentally friendly. In order to help organizations, the Erasmus project brings together IT specialists, lawyers and employees in the field of education.

Estonia is an example for others

Maria Claudia Solarte-Vasquez's academic background is in law, but she has also always been interested in sustainability. Solarte-Vasquez considers it important to approach the topic as versatile as possible and to create solutions that would work in the long term.

Since Vasquez has lived in Estonia for several years and has also received citizenship, he can tell a thing or two about life here. For example, he points out that we are an example for other EU countries both in responsible use of resources and in the use of digital resources in the IT field. TalTech was included in the project precisely because the organization has experience and knowledge to share with others.

Help from Erasmus

Why should Erasmus come to the aid of organizations?

Andrijana Bogdanovska, head of the project coordinating center, explains that companies are mostly not willing to spend extra to train employees to behave more sustainably. Thus, with the Erasmus+ project, a team of specialists from different fields was put together, who would create scientifically developed methods and tools for companies to make employees' behavioral habits greener.

The main question is precisely how the company's communication specialists can share both knowledge and practical tools with the rest of the team in order to introduce new measures.

The project team did several studies to create the methods and to find out how to better communicate the topic. Mélissa Levaillant from the French Research Center helped deal with the scientific side, according to whom it was very interesting to put together information on both communication and sustainability.

By now, the two-year project is half way through. Work is currently underway on which training method would work best. Further, there are plans to create a platform that PR managers could use and implement in the company.

How to find a common language?

According to Vasquez, one of the biggest challenges has been finding consensus. Specialists from different fields participate in the project, who must combine their knowledge. The big question is how to convey one's wealth of knowledge and its importance to others in such a way that IT people can understand lawyers or education workers and vice versa.

"At the same time, it has been very useful for everyone to understand how much different knowledge is needed for the success of the project. We understand more and more how limited we all are with our great knowledge," notes Vasquez.

One step towards greater change

But how to finally convince people not to use the car and choose another alternative? According to Vasquez, this is also a good nut.

"People want to go to work as comfortably as possible," he notes. And although, for example, the public transport network in Tallinn is very good, it is not so in rural areas, and you have to make concessions in terms of comfort. In addition, everyone wants to be independent in their movements, their own masters. When traveling by public transport, however, you have to depend on the timetable, for example.

"We have taken on a very difficult task. However, we recognize that we cannot solve all the problems with this project, but we are taking one next step towards a more sustainable way of thinking,” states Vasquez.

LINK TO THE FULL ARTICLE IN ESTONIAN